No Heroes In This World
by ShhSleepy
Summary: Charlie has never faced this.Jason is dead.Not metaphorically but truly and completely dead.He couldn't protect uldn't save him.So when given the opportunity to get him back?Of course he'll take it.But what will it mean for the future? At what cost?
1. Where We Stand

**Alright you guys. This is shaping up to be pretty odd compared to other stories but I promise if you stick with me this story adds up to something much bigger in my next Aaron Stone Series bases souly on...^^ something different. You'll have to wait and see. The next Aaron Stone series I have planned is pretty intense if I do say so myself. No more joking around. So this is like the prologue to the next one and the epilogue to this one!  
**

**If you haven't read at least the story before this one A Silent Hero then I highly suggest you do or you will be a tid tad lost in here. And if you really want to get informed then I suggest My Not So Super Hero as well as Be My Own Hero to keep yourself organized in the story world. A whole lot has happened but I think you can get by with just reading this one if you don't like reading. I'm not gonna tell you to buzz off just cuz you haven't read the first 3. haha. ^^ So please- enjoy! **

**I accept any reviews you have. Love or hate or...LOVE! haha. Reviews are what keep me motivated to write so the faster I get reviews the quicker chapies go up. Keep it in mind, loves. If you've got a sec- post something. anything! One sentence! ONE WORD! I don't care! SO anyways- **

**Read, Review, and ENJOY!**

Notes: Takes place after Jason's death and Tetra and Charlie's confrontation.

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1 

It was the very last place that Charlie thought he would end up. In his mind when he had witnessed the pure complicity of Tetra and the genius of the creation, he had pictured the most intricate of labs and cities tucked away in some secluded location. It may have been secluded- this place he had been sent, but advanced was something it lacked in the scientist specialist department.

It seemed like days ago he had finished speaking with the computer about this-and-that ways to bring his brother back. It was a brother that seemed so prone to dangers and life threatening situations ever since he had learned the secret Charlie was keeping. Charlie had thought it was just Karma catching up on him. He had lied so much to keep Jason out of the loop and the day he found out was like the day a years worth of lies coming back to bite him in the butt. And despite all the lies and all the precautions Charlie had taken to keep his little brother out of it, Jason always found a way back in. He was always there prodding around where he shouldn't have been- until now.

Now there was no Jason to prod. He was dead and Charlie still hadn't been able to do anything. He hadn't had to lie to him. He hadn't had anything to hide but he still couldn't be there when Jason needed him most...again. and again. and again. and again. and again. Charlie ground his teeth. If Jason could have just stayed out of his way for once and not taken on the responsibility to look after him then maybe he would still be alive. Maybe it would be Buznik that were dead and not his baby brother-

Charlie shook his head. He couldn't have those thoughts on his mind. He was a hero. He was supposed to save everyone and even Buznik was important. He was important enough at least. He was human after all. Even if he was annoying as hell he was still worth being saved and still worth fighting for. Charlie had a feeling he wouldn't be feeling the same thing when he got back into his home town though. When Percy got rescued from the mountain he would be a bomb just waiting to go off. How much had he seen of Charlie and the mutant's fight? How much would other people believe of it? Charlie was banking on the possibility that they would think the large wrestler was semi-insane from being lost for so long and Charlie's secret would stay safe. Otherwise, Charlie was doomed as Aaron.

There was one thing he was thankful to Tetra for and that was the save. Not only had he provided- as untrustworthy and suspicious as it sounded- a way to save his little brother, but he had given him the transportation to get there. Even if _there_ was the very opposite of what he wanted after trucking through frozen terrain for several days. It seemed he couldn't find a single place that landed right in the middle of too hot or too cold. Here in this place he had been sent seemed like not just one step forwards but forty steps forward at once before he could catching up to his own feet. 

"Come on, Chacha. We won't get there by dark if you drag those feet around like that."

Charlie managed the weakest smile towards the small assistant Tetra had given to accompany him on his mission. Charlie had never missed Stan so much in his entire life. The small bot was hardly as large as a volleyball, a buzzing orb or wires, lights and metal. It hovered just around Charlie's shoulders, a squeaking voice that told Charlie the bot was supposed to be a female nearly never stopped from the words it was programmed to speak. Like Tetra- it was a highly advanced machine. It learned and as far as the red and blue lights that changed behind a glass shield, had emotions as well. It wasn't that the bot wasn't friendly or was impatient with Charlie. It was just about overly friendly. She was never silent. She never stopped. If it was a default in her program or made that way for the soul purpose of getting on Charlie's worn out nerves- Charlie would never know. But he decided that it was a flaw in her system as she claimed her name was Demo. Charlie assumed she was the default that had never been tested. 

"Chacha is tired." Demo buzzed, her circuits clicking together smoothly in a steady rhythm. She was programmed to speak English, French, Spanish, Arabic, Arakanese, Armenian, Ashante, Assyrian, Azerbaijani, German, Greek, Gujarati, Hebrew, Hindi, Sundanese, both the natural and arabic type, Susu, Swahili, Swedish, Finnish, Flemish, Polish, Portuguese and Portuguese Creole, Kashmiri, Kazakh, Norwegian, Nuer, Oromo, Chinese, Japanese, Korean and Dutch- but Charlie's name didn't seem to be in her system at all. It seemed chacha was the closest the creature could get without short circuiting herself. "Does Chacha need sleep? Demo is not tired. Demo can go alllll niiiiiiight looooong!" She sung in that high pitched robotic voice she had going for her. Charlie cracked another weak smile.

He was glad Demo was so talkative and upbeat. It was really what he needed right then. He had been feeding off her programmed false happiness for the past few hours and although he knew very well she wasn't a real living thing- her happiness was contagious and made his feet that much easier at walking forwards and not breaking down where he was.

Even if she talked way too much for such a small android.

"I'm not tired." Charlie lied as he wiped droplets of sweat and salt from his brow before it could sting his eyes.

A blue beam stretched out from Demo's glass "face" and ran the length of Charlie's body. "Scanner says that Chacha is tired. Scanner says that Chacha is a very poor liar."

Charlie rolled his eyes with slight irritation but also some amusement. "Chacha wants Demo to put her scanner away."

Demo was silent for a moment, completely still as it decided what it should do in such a situation as being spoken to. She was usually very fast with computing Charlie's words but on occasion Charlie got the feeling her programs were working faster then the rest of her could shift out the information.

Just when the silence was beginning to make it awkward- the bot began to whir again and the scanner retreated into the bots inner shell. "As you wish, Chacha. I live to serve." Came her happy response. "Correction says Demo. Demo does not live. Demo is created to serve. Apologies to Chacha."

Charlie shook his head. Demo was a good distraction for him. But he was still hurting. Self consciously he picked at his fingernails where they were still stained red underneath with familiar blood. He felt his eyes being pulled that way. Felt it in his heart that now was not the time to break down again but knew that looking would bring such a fit onto him.

"Chacha! I see it! I see the structure ahead!"

Charlie was pulled out of his daze to look ahead of them. Where Demo claimed to see their goal- Charlie could see nothing but stretching orange sand for miles and miles, tinted in the darkness to several different shades under the semi-moon.

"I don't see anything, Demo." Charlie grunted with irritation, grinding teeth for having his hopes brought up only to be dashed right back down.

"Not far at all. Demo can see it. Demo is programmed to see it. Chacha is silly and human. Silly human eyes thinking they can see what Demo can. Silly. Silly Chacha. Demo loves Chacha's silly silliness."

Charlie shook his head but couldn't keep the smallest twitch of a smile off his face. "Sorry, just tell me how much longer, Demo?"

"Computing..."

Charlie listened as the android buzzed and clicked out a measurement before singing back to life, the lights on her "face" tilting in a way that hinted at enjoyment and excitement.

"Processed. 8 hours. 1.92% of one day. 480 minutes. 28,800 seconds. 28,800,000 milliseconds. 490,346,102,7-"

"Alright, Demo. That's enough. Thank you." Charlie cut her off with a wave of his hand. "Eight hours then..."

That could feel a hell of a lot longer in Egypt.

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_So there you have it! A new beginning to a story. Again- chapters are more spread out then my first two stories. More so like how I posted my third one. Review please! I wanna know everything you have on mind! Please! =) Next chapie soon when I get around to editing it up. ^^_

_Laterrrrs!_


	2. The Irritations of Sand and All Its Uses

**I wasn't gonna post this one so soon but I got really psyched about this story last night! I love your reviews! I'm so glad to hear from those of you who have been following me from the beginning and I love to hear from newcomers as well! Haha- it seems little Demo is quite popular in here. I'm glad you like her. She's the most fun about this story. She makes Charlie's angst a little less repetitive with some breaks here and there. Needed a balance and she provides it. More of her to come! I love her as well! 3**

**Here's the next chapie! Hope you guys enjoy it! REVIEW! I won't post the third till I get a few reviews so post away, loves! ^^**

_**Read, Review and ENJOY! **_

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2

While the days might have been scorching and unbearably hot- the nights were like the devil. Charlie shivered when the sun went down and only warmed himself by leaning closely to Demo's heated circuits. She overheated easily so by the time night came, she blew off warm air through her vents like a heater, trying to get rid of it while Charlie tried to collect whatever of it drifted his way.

The sand underneath him felt soft to the touch but in the morning it was always such a bother. When it got into his shoes and slid beneath the belt of his pants and into his shirt- the sand rash and chaffing pains bothered him for hours and hours. There was no relief from it. There was no escape from the pains that came with the desert. He swallowed hard- throat dry but not to the point where he would risk drinking and running out of the supply of water Tetra had given him.

The pains that came with a dead brother...

Charlie felt hot tears prick at his eyes and shook them away. He hated this all. He hated everything. He wanted to just curl up in the orange sand and just die. He rolled onto his back and stared up at the sky, nestling down deeper into the ground as if the blanket of soft grains could comfort him in his time of agony. Hold him close like a mother would if she was here. Demo's clicking nearby cooed to him that everything was alright. It would be alright in the morning when he woke up. He wasn't going to wake up though because he wasn't going to sleep. How could he with this hole in his heart the size of Jason's?

He felt something sticking against his face and breathed in a hard sobbing breath as sand clung to the tears on his cheeks. His hair that had grown longish stuck to the wet trails but he would not reach to move it.

_Did it hurt when you died, Jason?  
_

"Damn it, God." He whispered in the darkness. He had never been very religious in any state of form but lately he found himself calling out as if he was. It gave his mind someone to blame that wasn't himself. It set him at peace knowing maybe this wasn't all on his shoulders as a responsibility and maybe it was a destiny that couldn't be stopped in the first place. "Damn it, God...why Jason?"

His whisper was so silent it blended with the sounds of the wind, melting into the background like an invisible ghost trapped in the human world. Unseen and unheard but most definitely there struggling and fighting for air that wouldn't come.

"He was just a kid. He didn't do anything. Damn it, God. Give him back..." His dry lips cracked in the darkness and he sniffed. "Jason."

When he fell asleep and how he did was something unbeknown to him. But he couldn't breath. A tickle in his throat made his eyes open an unlabeled time later and they did so to a stinging feeling.

He didn't know how but he had somehow nestled himself down deeply into the sand- deep enough so that his mouth was covered and his arms were pinned to his sides. The sun was not even cracking over the horizon and Demo was on stand-by mode next to him. He couldn't hear the quiet sounds of her buzzing and whizzing. His ears were consumed under the sand.

He was so confused. How had he sunk this far down into solid ground? Surely such a thing was impossible even in the thin sand. He tried to shift his arms and felt his body suck down deeper into the earth, his nostrils very well nearly shut from air when he struggled. He lay perfectly still.

Quick sand? How had he been so stupid to set up camp here? Shouldn't Demo have noticed such a thing when she set herself down? Yet she had not sunk at all. She was perfectly alright where she lay, an orb of technology in a vast ocean of primitiveness. She was safe. Charlie was going to die.

Charlie tried to suck in air from his nose and felt sand in his nostrils. He snuffed it out and felt his body sink when his chest expanded. He wasn't getting anywhere. The more he moved the farther down he went. He needed air. He needed to move to wake Demo just long enough for her to realize what was happening.

He thrust his arms upward in an attempt at being quick but the earth held him back and made the motion more like a push against the ground, propelling himself deeper in the sand trap while his arms rose over his head. He took a single breath and shut his eyes when his face sunk under the ground.

Above him he could feel the cool air brushing his fingers and knew at least a part of him was still safe. The thought gave him hope even as his lungs began to burn and strain. How hard would it be to get sand out of his lungs? He had never imagined before. He tried his best to rest his forearms against the ground above him, pulling with all his might. He couldn't budge. Every motion was a push against what he originally wanted as a goal. He needed help. He needed to wake Demo. He needed a hand.

His hands...

He felt his head growing thicker and foggier as he clapped his hands as hard as he could, making as much noise as possible and hoping the little droid would hear his movements. He snapped his fingers, threw sand and clapped until he felt the palms of his hands begin to join him under the earth.

_No God, NO! I need to keep going! _

And something smooth and cold brushed his fingertips and he heard a muffled sounding. _"Demo will save Chacha to death!"_ Charlie was so wrapped up in hope at getting rescued that he barely caught Demo's grammatical mistake at wishing to save him _"to death"._

_DEMO!_

She was awake! She heard him! He grasped around her shell, held on for dear life as he felt her use all her power to lift into the air. He felt her trembling and struggling, the air vents blowing steam and heat against Charlie's wrists while she fought her own strength.

"Demo is like a truck! Demo is strong! Demo is a superhero who can lift scrawny human Chacha from stinky meanie sand! _Grrrrrrr_!" The bot clicked out to motivate her cause.

_Come on Demo... Come on..._

Charlie's thoughts were getting so thick. He could barely hear himself think. He could barely register the air and tell his lungs to breath when Demo pulled him from the sand trap and onto real land.

"Demo is victorious! Sand is no match for Demo! Demo is evolved!" Demo called into the air as she did loops around Charlie's head, momentarily forgetting why she had had to strain herself so hard in the first place.

Charlie's chest finally expanded of it's own will and he caughed hard into the sand, pressing his fast against it and wretched into the ground, saliva clinging to his lips but he sputtered it away, laying still, feeling the grains all over his body and some he knew inside his throat like sand paper inside him.

"Chacha!" Demo whirred in fear and concern as her programs caught up to what her task was at hand. She flew down to get as close to Charlie's face as she could without touching him. "Chacha is alive? Please let Chacha still be alive. Chacha will speak to me! Chacha!" There was a short pause and then- "Scanning..."

Charlie's eyes were shut even as he heard her scanner protrude from her shell and run him over. It had not been more than ten seconds before there was a rushing whir and Demo let out a high pitched beep.

"Chacha lives! Chacha is just faking sleeping! Opens his eyes and look at me- Chacha! Demo apologizes! Demo apologizes! Demo apologizes very much, Chacha. I is sorry. I ask for forgiveness! Chacha!"

Charlie could hear the pure and true pain in her voice. She had truly adapted since they had first met. She had adapted to truly care about him and he felt a small smile touch his lips. "I'm okay, Demo. It's okay."

He heard her whirring doubtfully and watched the red lights on her face flicker to blue, lines forming a sad face behind the glass as her shell half closed. "Not okay. Doesn't need scanner to tell Chacha is lying."

"You saved me, Demo." Charlie assured her, feeling the need to comfort the partner given to him. "...But hey- am I really _that _scrawny?"

There was a long pause before Demo buzzed out a soft. "Demo cannot answer because Demo is not programmed to lie like Chacha is programed."

Charlie laughed at this and shook his head. His laugh was short lived as a dark scowl hit his face.

He had said it was okay...

...But it wasn't okay. Not_ everything _was at least.

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_There you have it! Chapter 2! I realize this beginning is on the slow side but when they get to the "structure" as Demo says- it gets a whole lot more in depth and exciting. Please review- tell me your thoughts about the chapter/story/what you had for lunch. Anything you want! Next chapter coming soon as you want it! Thanx!_


	3. Righteous, Respected, Just and Dangerous

**Sorry guys that this chapter took so long. It's a transition chapter and we all know how much I love (*hate) transition chapters. haha. And all my friends and my boyf just graduated high school so i've been a little depressed cuz I'm stuck here for another two years. It really sux to have friends who are older than you. But good luck to all of you out there heading to collage and try not to forget the little people thinking about you every day back in HS. haha. It was that... and the fact that I was waiting for more reviews. Thanks to those who did! ^^ This chapie's for you loves!**

**Read, Review and Enjoy!**

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3

It was the very last type of building Charlie was expecting. That seemed to be happening a whole lot lately. It seemed the more he told himself he was positive something would end up one way- the very opposite went out of it's way to happen to him. It was like a game the world was playing against him. It kept throwing him lemons and when he finally gave in and decided to make lemonade it decided to toss him salt instead of sugar. The entire planet seemed to be working against him alone...

...well not completely alone. He still had Tetra and Demo on his side and he was eternally grateful for them.

_Maybe I should wish Jason dead- then the world might give him back._

But this was the very last building he had expected to see. When Tetra told him that he would be searching for a scientist Charlie had expected to be thrown into a metropolitan city. Not a sandy baron desert wasteland. And even when he was standing in the desert a million miles away from any life form and a million miles away from where he thought he would be placed, he still expected some sort of hide away facility much like the one he had come across in the mountains a few months back. He remembered the facility like it was the back of his hand. It was tucked high in the mountains camouflaged by snow and pine trees and away from all civilization for the soul purpose of protecting it's contents like an ugly clam would the pearl inside. But it was still clearly a scientific facility. The walls were thick and stable cement and there were all sorts of visible devices and technology hooked up to keep people just like Charlie out. It was safe and when Charlie had been dropped in the desert that had been his forst thought.

Who would build something way out here? Why on earth would anyone want to be all the way out here unless they never wanted to be found or stumbled across. Even then Charlie had a feeling what he was looking for was here for a reason. It was safe out here. BUt this building...

...it was not what he expected.

If any building had ever been so large he had never come across it before. Sure he had seen plenty of city skyscrapers stories and stories high and although the height was not quite as belittling- it dwarfed Charlie in size by a billion and he found himself craning his neck to look up at it. The doors were easily the size of his entire house back home and large stone pillars rose from the sand. Yellow and white lime stone crusting away in areas to open up the black insides of the building where it was just dark enough so that there was no way Charlie could even guess what was waiting inside. He wondered how many rooms there were hidden inside. How many chambers were there above the sand and how many more were there burried down and down deep into the earth and grains of red. How easily it would be to get lost. He only hoped it was as large inside as it was outside. Perhaps it would be easy- one large room that lead straight to the man he was searching for. One room and he could be out with the key to his brother's life.

Yet he was unnerved. Across the walls were all sorts of markings and scrapes, dripping once but dried now in long streaks of red and purple, spelling things Charlie didn't understand and drawings of grotesque murals Charlie could only see as terrifying. He didn't understand his feelings but the dark pit in his stomach told him to be afraid and he was.

"Demo..." He whispered and why he whispered he didn't know.

"Yes? I sense a question in your voice."

"Do you have any idea what we're supposed to do when we get inside?"

Demo laughed a little and the lines on her face flashed to curved lines to show her joy. "Of course not, Chacha. But this is why we have Tetra."

Charlie's brow furrowed. "Tetra? He's not even here. He can't leave his program."

"I don't need to leave the programmed position to communicate with you, Aaron."

Where the voice came from had Charlie jumping at first as his eyes scanned for the shadow-like being anywhere around them. He couldn't see him though. There was no transparent shape of looming force and there wasn't even the harsh ringing he heard before. Instead it was replaced by the sound of static in an old radio. It grew louder then quieter like someone was playing with a dial that had no hope of anything less than static and bugs coming over the static came that familiar voice of Tetra- calm and monotonous like he had been the moment he had plucked him off the mountain and sucked him clueless into his program.

Then his eyes locked on Demo and he saw that the lights on her face had gone out completely to be replaced by a white line across the screen. It shivered with the static and when Tetra next spoke it moved in zig zags like a little heart monitor.

"You have made it far, Aaron. I was begining to wonder if you would ever make it to this place."

Charlie scoffed, rolling his eyes. "Ya know, it would have been much easier if you had just dropped me right in front of this thing in the first place."

Tetra didn't even hesitated to speak again, half cutting Charlie off like he already knew what he was going to say. It unnerved Charlie but he stayed still as much as his spine began to creep. "I already told you I am not as strong as I used to be. My programing is being blocked and I am only here through my determination to adapt and evolve out of what my creator decides of me. We've been over this. Tetra does not repeat itself."

Charlie nodded stiffly. Even in Demo's little innocent shell of a body- Tetra had a way of intimidating him.

"So what- I spend the next few days searching this giant place randomly to find a single guy with an antidote? This sounds like a terrible plan." Charlie scowled.

"He will be in the heart of the facility where he has been locked away. Keep in mind this building is not secure. He has been trapped inside for years upon years. What he has accomplished in that time might frighten you and might endanger your life. You are aware-"

It sounded like a question the way he put it out there but Charlie couldn't be sure the way his voice stayed so flat. He decided to answer, nodding darkly. "I'm aware that my brother has been endangered as well... and is already... already..." He bit his lip and skipped it, "because of it." He pinched the bridge of his nose. "I'm ready for anything in there."

Tetra paused and the line fell flat for a moment before he continued. "You are not ready for anything. But I have no doubts you will accomplish what I send you to do. Tetra's creator is not a merciful being. He will corrupt you. Delete him. Get the antidote and you will get what is yours."

Charlie opened his mouth to speak again but Tetra didn't let him.

"I am sending a layout through Demo from my memory. Keep in mind things may have changed since I have been a section of this facility."

Charlie didn't like the way he said a "section of this facility". A part of it. Charlie was reminded once more that Tetra was not a feeling, living, breathing being. He was a computer. He was a program created by humans and corrupted and adapted into his own guiltless master. This time- he could not help the shiver that ran the length of his body. What techology could do was frightening.

"Move quickly." Tetra said on an end note before the line flashed and then disappeared like a shooting star in the middle of Demo's screen. Very slowly, her face came back as smiley and joyful as before.

"Tetra speaks to you but does not speak to poor Demo. Poor Demo feels envious of silly human Chacha. But Demo can be happy for you. Tetra is just. Tetra is righteous and good. Tetra can save us all."

Charlie tilted his head. He didn't understand how much Demo seemed to respect the computer Tetra. To him he was rather intimidating and freaky. Charlie trusted him but at the same time there was a feeling tugging in the back of his mind whenever he was in the computer's presence. Something was always off about him. He guessed it came with the fact that Tetra had more or less been Demo's life key. He had brought her with him and was her master when it all came down to things. Charlie decided not to speak of his inner concerns about Tetra to the bot as he began pulling himself through a broken away hole in the door to the structure where the limestone had crumbled. He didn't know how deeply her respect for Tetra went.

"Man, this place looks like a giant mausoleum. Like a tomb, almost, right Demo?"

Demo's light lit up the temple hallway enough for Charlie to see how ancient and breathtaking it was on the inside. She giggled slightly and Charlie felt a little better knowing his speculations were so funny to her. "But of course, silly Chacha. Where else would we bury the dead?"

Charlie's stomach dropped and Demo's high pitched laughing echoed through the darkness.

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_Next chapter coming soon! Even sooner if you review please! Let me know your thoughts! ANything at all and please- Enjoy your summer everyone! ^^_

_Reviewwwww! I wanna know what you thought about Tetra and Demo and actually- especially Tetra. I like him personally but I think I need to make him a little more dark. Opinions? =)_


	4. Many More than One Alives

**Sorry these are all taking so long to get up. It's summer- ya know? It's much easier to type them up during school. lols. ^^ I've just been busy but no I don't plan on ditching this story so always expect another chapter to come after the one before. =) Thank you all so much for the reviews. If you've stuck with this story so far then you are to be rewarded. Things really start to pick up here. I don't have any transition chapters planned for the future in this story which is great news for me but if there is one i'll letcha know. haha.**

**Anyhoo- _Read, Review, and Enjoy!_**

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4

The shiver that ran down Charlie's spine was enough to rattle his teeth in his head. A tomb… They were in a tomb… Just the thought made his skin crawl. He vaguely remembered Tetra telling him about how he had lay his master to rest so many years before but Charlie had assumed he meant locked in his lab the way he told the story. Locked away with a bunch of bodies was a much different story.

Demo buzzed next to him in her high pitched sort of way and made sneaking into the hall nearly impossible. Charlie couldn't hear the silence and it unnerved him. He could only hear the sound of his own heart thundering in his ears and Demo. Demo. But no silence. How he wished he could just hear the silence just once.

It was a strange thing but Charlie loved to hear the silence. It made him feel safe in a place like this. When every step he took echoed he was sure every step anyone else took would echo as well. But when his heart was so damn loud he would never be able to tell if those were his own steps he was hearing echoing back at him or someone else.

Something else.

The walls to the hall he had slid into were high and long, stretching up into the darkness so high above Charlie's head that he couldn't even hope to see where they ended in the shadows. Along them were statues one hundred times Charlie's size, shaped like ancient soldiers and beasts that Charlie had never imagined. Of what had not crumbled with age, Charlie could make out the slashing claws and dangling jaws of the creatures carved by who had to have been the devil himself. Spiny legs and bone ridden bodies stared perpetually into the shadows lining the tunnels. Wide fearful rage written on stone faces as hardened saliva dripped from between limestone gums past snake like tongues.

"God…" Charlie whispered as he watched the terrible creatures that seemed to only grow uglier with his steps deeper into the blackness. A stone fell from an unsteady and ill enforced ceiling to land at his feet, clattering a few jumps before laying still somewhere unseen. He glanced up to make sure the beasts had not been awakened although he was certain such a thing wouldn't have been possible. Just stone. They were just stones.

And the more his fear escalated the more he began to think of his brother. He knew the creature that had killed him. He remembered the dangling jaw and the mutated flesh, created from something that had once been human and had then become monster. What were these creatures really? Were they really beasts? Were they really animals? How was Charlie to know? It was a terrible thing. It was merciless. If he himself were tormented and changed into such a thing. If he had been the body stolen and taken into a test tube experiment, morphed into a beast that no human eye could look upon without fear or disgust- would he have turned out any different than the thing that had murdered his little brother? Would he have been able to live his life peacefully in a world without any peace or would it eventually eat him alive inside and turn him into more an animal and less a man.

If it were him would he have murdered his brother?

He shook his head. No. There was always the choice and what people may make you out to be- animalism was always something man could and should have been able to fight. How come it wasn't so though? Why did man have to become beast when under pressure? Why did man seem to think it was necessary to prod and poke and test until the mind broke and the body burst forth as something unnatural and ultra powerful? It was a sad thing. These creatures, were they always as such-

Charlie rounded a bend and something hard smacked him across his chest, wide eyes and slashing teeth springing forwards at him. So caught off guard his feet slid out on the sand under him and he went down hard, his head slamming against the stone floor and a bright light filling his vision till the room stopped spinning. His legs scrambled under him to get out from under the beast that had attacked him in the darkness.

Demo was laughing.

Why was she laughing? Had she betrayed him so easily? He was in danger and she was giggling nearly manically in a way that reminded Charlie that she was in fact- Tetra's creation.

"Silly Chacha jumping around like a monkey boy. Humans walk on feet, Chacha. I have never seen a human yet to walk on his rump."

Charlie managed a stiff smile as he looked once more at his "attacker", heart stilling as he noticed it was stone just like the other beast sharing the tunnel with them. "Yeah…" Charlie panted as he stood, dusting himself off. "My imagination is just getting to me. All these dead things… I suppose I've watched one too many monster movies in my life. I think I'll stick to comedies from now on, ya'know? It almost feels like… like I dunno. Like we aren't the only things alive in here. But it's only a tomb. Dead things can't hurt us."

"Such a jokester, Chacha is." Demo giggled and it was contagious, spreading to Charlie as well. "Always with the jokes. If Demo had a brain and nerves Demo would be cracking up." There was a short pause and her pieces clicked while her program caught up with herself before her face went back to it's happy state and she hovered closer to Charlie's shoulder. "We aren't after all the only alive's in here. Correction. Charlie is a life. Demo is program. Apologies."

Charlie's head tilted to the side. The news just kept getting better and better. "What do you mean we aren't the only ones alive in-"

"_You _are the only one alive in-"

"Right. Right, Right_. I'm _the only one alive in here." Charlie said in a fluster, rushing through Demo's corrections. "We're in a tomb. There's no way anything could survive locked up in this place. They would have to have left a long time ago to even hope to survive and since we're in a desert…"

Demo giggled like this was a funny thing and said lightheartedly, "Well of course they wouldn't leave. They don't need to. Mr. Nefertum Runihura doesn't leave. And for…computing…"

Charlie ground his teeth. "Give me a rough estimate, Demo."

"…many many years, he has been locked away in this place."

"So? What's the point?"

"So he is a highly advanced scientist locked away in a place with very little resources and the knowledge to create or destroy a life potion. What else is slightly not sane human supposed to do with his time but test on what he has been given?"

Charlie swallowed hard. "So you're saying you think that he might have spread his life potion or knowledge or…whatever to things in this place? Dead things?"

"Undead things." Demo buzzed.

Another rock fell from the ceiling and Charlie jumped this time. "You really think so?" He whispered, feeling less at ease than he had ever felt as he realized the sounds of scraping along the ceiling way overhead. Scraping and dragging like stone and claws. He couldn't even hope to see through the darkness to whatever may or may not have been hiding there. For the first time since he had entered the tunnel, he could hear past the sound of his heart and the buzzing of Demo to hear into what was not silence at all.

"I know so, Chacha. I see silly dead thing. Correction. Undead. Demo apologizes."

Charlie looked up in time to see a huge spider like creature spring from the shadows and was just slow enough to _not _dodge out of the way.

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_AHHHHHHhhhhhhhhhhhh! Giant spider undead thing! 0_o RUN CHACHA RUN! lols. Let's see what else we can find hiding in the tomb. It should be rather exciting what poor Charlie can't see. _


	5. Mutant Monster Arachnophobia

**Very short chapters I know. All of them are gonna be a bit short unfortunatly. Summer is not a very good time to write a story- let me tell you. lols. Hope you enjoy it anyhow. Charlie bashing in here for those in the reviews that said they wanted some. lols and Demo cuteness! XD**

_**Read Review and Enjoy!**_

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5

It fell on Charlie like a boulder, crashing into his head and knocking all the wind out of him at once. He gasped, tasting blood in his mouth when his teeth snapped shut down on his tongue and feeling his nose throbbing when he hit the ground. He scrambled backwards with his legs as the beast above him slashed long sharp spines his way. He lifted a shaking leg and nailed the beast in what looked like it's face, watching it hiss and retreat away from him for a moment. It was just a moment enough for him to get back his bearings and he stumbled to his feet to get a better look at his attacker.

It looked like a spider to him. In fact there was no way it was anything less than a spider. It may have been more though. It looked as if it had been fed toxic waste and mutated over time. Tiny hairs on it's body had grown out much longer and rougher. When it opened it's pinchers to hiss inside was a second layer of razor teeth that buzzed like the teeth on a chainsaw, clicking together and dripping with bubbling saliva. There were gashes and laccarasions all over it's body like it had been tested and tormented for years upon years and the hatred in all of its red eyes showed Charlie his unfaltering despise for humans. When it walked forwards, it's feet stabbed deep holes in the stone underneath it like blades. Yet still it drew backwards. Hissing in challenge.

"D...Demo?" Charlie whispered as he watched the little bot's face blank out for a moment before flashing into what looked like worry. "A little help?"

"Demo not strong, Chacha. Demo not know how to assist human." Demo buzzed back. "You will do fine, human."

The creature reared back and within the next moment- was upon Charlie.

Charlie shouted. He had not even seen the spider move but suddenly it was in his face, snapping it's pinchers at him and scraping it's legs along the floor in an attempt to get closer. Charlie backed up as much as he could till his back hit the wall behind him. Even then he yanked his arms away in fear of getting them torn off and arched his neck back to avoid decapitation.

"Dude, I am not getting taken out by a bug!" He shouted as the creature lurched forwards. He flung himself to the side, rolling against the ground at the same time as a crash behind him echoed through the tunnel and rock rained down on him. The creature having burst a hole directly through the wall where he had been standing moments ago. It was a hole that could have very well been put through his chest.

Through the rumble and he roars, he could make out Demo's tiny voice somewhere unseen shouting for him to "kick it's butt!" "take that Araneide Salticidae and shove it where the sun don't shine!" and Charlie's favorite "don't get eaten!"

Charlie rolled as a leg began to desend on him from where he was still crashed againth the stone ground, missing him by inches when he dove away. He forgot how many limbs it had though. Eight legs were really hard to keep track of, especially in the semi darkness- only lit up by Demo's blueish glow.

Another leg came down just to the right of his ribcage and Charlie managed to roll away in fear of being impaled. Unfortunatly he managed to roll away from one leg and right into the fire of another. He screamed as he felt a long bladelike leg peirce into the flesh of his left shouldre, sinking all the way through to the ground behind him and pinning him there to the ground.

The pain was excruciating and he ground his teeth, tears dotting the corners of his eyes as he screamed his lungs out, grunting when he had gotten ahold of himself. he had to focus. He couldn't die here.

The spider held him down with the leg and reached it's pinchers towards Charlie's throat. With his other arm, Charlie managed to lift his gauntlet and fire a shot directly into the spider's eyes.

What seemed like a good idea at the time turned out to be a mistake. The creature through a fit and lurched up on it's back legs, tearing out of Charlie's shoulder in the same instance and sending the hero flying against a wall.

Charlie felt the cold of the stone on his back, the world spinning as he watched the spider back away from him, yellow blood leaking from one of it's eyes and from the edges of it's pinchers. Out of breath and dizzy from the loss of blood, Charlie staggered to his feet, raising the gauntlet again. He couldn't let the spider get so close to him again or he knew it would be the death of him.

The creature opened it's mouth to hiss and Charlie fired three shots into it's mouth, missing the first time. With one last hiss of rage, the spider scattered towards the wall opposite and clung to the stone, beginning a climb up into the darkness again.

"Not getting away that easy." Charlie hissed through the spots in his eyes. He aimed and fired twice, taking one of the legs off the creature with his gauntlet and burning another one. The spider fell, landing hard on it's back in the tunnel as Charlie stumbled over, feeling his own blood soaking his shirt and oozing down his back and he remembered his brother. The blood. All the blood...

Charlie let out a roar much like a beast and not so much like a human and fired a dozen shots into the creatures face. And when he was done and the spider lay motionless and dead he pried open the spider's pinchers and fired several more down it's throat, tears blurring his vision as he screamed in rage.

Without any energy left in him he fell back and lay down on the ground, his shoulder throbbing in time with the beating of his heart. Demo hovered over to fly next to him, lowering to get close enough to spray his shoulder with a bubbly something that made his body burn in agony before the wound went completely numb.

"You know, Chacha..." Demo began softly, clearly trying to cheer him up a bit. "...spiders are more afraid of you than you are of them."

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_Please review. It will make me write faster I swear. If I dont think people are interested I don't get inspired very well. haha. The next chapter is a brotherly fluff/love chapter. It's gonna be very cute. I promise. And then some action to top it off. ^^ Please stay in touch. Keep your eyes open for the next one. If I get 3 reviews Ill write faster. If I get more even better. haha. HAVE AN AWESOME SUMMER!_


	6. Mowing the Lawn to Death

**This started as a cute chapter and quickly turned into my more...um...gruesome pieces. **

_NOTE! This chapter has been edited! It was a bit too gruesome for my own taste. I have no clue what aweful mood I was in when I wrote it but it has been edited. Still not pretty but alot prettier than it used to be. Apologies from the author. ^^ hehe- thaaaaaaats me! =D_

**It's not a pretty picture...well its very pretty to start off but never ends happy does it? WE wouldn't want Charlie to be _happy_ or anything now would we? haha. btw- it might not make any sense but trust me it will. It just does. You'll have to stay tuned though.  
**

**_ Read, Review and Enjoy. _**

**_REVIEWWWWwwwww!_**

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6

Charlie woke up in the morning, rolling onto his side and stretching his arms out over his head. The morning sleepies were still in the corners of his eyes and he rubbed them away, scratching at his chest when the cool air from his fan hit him.

His feet were always the first things to hit the floor when he woke up and it was always his least favorite part of the morning. Curling his bare toes against the chilling wooden panels till the numbness died down, he turned his head to look out the window. Despite the weather man's constant badgering of the rain that was sure to come, the sky was as blue as it had ever been and rays of sunlight streamed through the glass to blind him momentarily.

It was a perfect day for some Hero Rising if he had ever seen one.

The thought that he knew his mother wouldn't be so proud of made him smile and he laughed just a little when he stood to dress. He had all the time in the world that morning. No work. No school. No upcoming tests. No nothing. He was completely at his own mercy- ready to take on his weekend like the irresponsible teenage boy he was born to be.

He took the stairs two at a time on his way down, walking through the kitchen and opening the fridge more so out of habit and less so for the fact that he was hungry for anything. He wasn't which was strange to him. He usually supported breakfast as one of the most important meals and showed it by nearly bursting from food intake but this morning he wasn't up for it. He wasn't even up for his rushed piece of unbuttered toast. And his stomach was alright with that.

"Damn it!" He heard a call from outside and went to the window. From the light shining through he had to squint to see but could clearly make out his little brother. He tossed himself down on the ground next to the lawnmower that he kicked hard in an attempt at revenge and only got a very bruised toe to show for it. The look alone on Jason's face made Charlie snicker.

"Problems, bro?" Charlie called out to him from the doorway, sliding it open and leaning against the frame. His arms crossed over his chest the way he did when he was playing part of the awesome and flawless big brother, his biceps rising slightly when his half smile hit his face. Showing off. He wasn't much of one but on such a perfect day- making Jason a little bit irritated was as much as he could do.

"No. No problem at all." Jason grumbled back sarcastically. "The lawn mower just decided to freakin' explode though." He rested his elbows on his bent knees, grasping his hands in the middle and averting his eyes so he didn't have to look at Charlie.

Charlie admitted he felt a little bad for Jason's dilemma. It was actually Charlie's turn to mow the lawn but in a rushed moment to leave for work yesterday morning, their mother had ordered the closest son in the room to go through with the chore. Jason got the short straw. Or the short grass at least.

Charlie's lame inner pun made him smile again. His mood was ever growing by the second.

"Come on. Lemme take a look." Charlie said, walking over to where his brother had quit and taking a look at the machine. He gave the chord a tug and got nothing but a hissing buzz from it that sounded alot like it was striking against stones and not grass. "Did you clear everything off the lawn before you started?" Charlie asked, rolling the mower over on it's side so he could take a look at the bottom of it.

"Yeah. Of course I did." Jason grumbled, crossing his arms. The sun hit his brother's head and cast a shadow across his face but in the same instant lit it with a bright glow in a way that was nearly surreal to Charlie. He blinked and beamed at his brother. For a strange instant he felt a burning in the back of his throat that traveled to his nose and tears prickled the corners of his eyes. "Dude, you okay?" Jason asked, bright blue eyes locking on his brother. "You look like you just lost a game of Hero Rising to a newb."

Charlie shook his head, sniffing. He really didn't know where his burst of emotions came from but it continued to swell in his heart till he forced his eyes to look away from his baby brother and re examine the lawn mower before him.

Clear as day was the problem Jason had hit. "And you're sure you cleared off the lawn before you started?"

"I already told you yes." Jason grumbled.

Charlie laughed and reached carefully into the blades, pulling out the remains of a popped red kickball, in tatters and woven deeply into the parts of the poor lawnmower. "Are you sure?" Charlie asked for a third time as he pulled out the remains.

Jason's face flushed a little and his lower lip stuck out in a defiant pout. "Yeah so? Anyone could have missed that."

Charlie laughed. "It's a giant red ball in the middle of the lawn." He snickered. "Well, not giant anymore." He tossed the shredded piece at Jason and his brother managed to be slow enough not to dodge it. It slapped against his face and landed in his outstretched hands.

"What's it to you, anyhow?" Jason said but there was a smile in his voice and his eyes grinned at Charlie from where he was sitting in the only half completed lawn.

"Come on, let's go do something. Get outta the house or something. Go somewhere, ya know?" He kicked his brother lightly to get him to his feet and Jason stood, brushing strands of grass off the seat of his jeans.

"Like what? We've got food in the house and Hero Rising hooked up in your room. What else do we need?"

Charlie rolled his eyes. "Dude, I'm a little sick of that game to tell you the truth." He didn't know where those words came from. His face paled slightly. He didn't feel like himself suddenly. Sick of hero rising? Why would he say something like that? How could anyone be sick of such a spectacular game?

"Sick of it? Man, you weren't saying that when you were dominating my scored on the hand held. What, do you just wipe me off high score history for the fun of it?"

"Jase, 600 is hardly a high score." Charlie laughed, teasingly, punching Jason's arm.

Jason scowled and punched back just a bit harder. Charlie grinned at his little brother's stubbornness. "I was just warming up. Those were memories you erased, dude. Not scores. And now I'll never get those memories back."

Charlie snickered. "Maybe its a good thing I wiped em out then. No more evidence of a failed first attempt."

Jason opened his mouth to fight back but Charlie interrupted him. He wasn't in the mood to fight with Jason just then. "Let's go get a pizza or something, little bro."

Jason looked up at his brother like he had lost his mind. "We can just have one dropped at the house. There's this new thing called delivery. It's really cool. You see...they _deliver_ it to us."

Charlie laughed. He had never been in such a great mood before. "Not that I dont enjoy your pure laziness in the matter but it's a beautiful day. Let's get outta the house for once." He started walking, taking keys he didn't remember grabbing out of his pocket as he headed for the car. "I'll even let you pick the soda." It wasn't for a few steps that he realized his brother wasn't following him. He looked back over his shoulder at his little bro, tilting his head. "What?"

"Beautiful?" Jason raised his eyebrows. "Charlie- look at the sky."

Charlie glanced up, ready to prove his brother wrong before his eyes locked on a sky much less blue and much more black. The darkest storm clouds rolled over the roof of his house and wind began to howl to the point where he felt the need to brace himself from falling over. "The hell..." He mumbled as thunder and lightning shook the ground.

"Charlie!" Jason shouted over the storm that Charlie couldn't understand he hadn't noticed before. "We need to go inside! It's not safe!"

Charlie nodded, barely able to hear his own thoughts as he headed towards the house, arms up to block his face from the wind.

A bolt of lighting shot from the sky and blasted the big tree in their yard. "JASON LOOK OUT!" Charlie screamed desperately but was too late. He wasn't fast enough as a branch crashed down and crushed his brother underneath. Blood and guts oozed from the lump that was his brother as the rain washed away pink underneath the mutilated form. Charlie puked as he stared at the sharpened sticks and limbs skewering Jason like a shish-kabob unnaturally accurate from a falling tree branch. Blood like tears ran down Jason's white face. Charlie puked again anything he had left in his stomach as he screamed. Why did this scenario feel so familiar? Why did this feel so complete? He tried hard to lift the branch from Jason's form although he knew he was dead. Even so, Jason's bloodied and impossible face looked at Charlie, a corner of white lips tinged red as he tried to speak.

"Ch-char...lie. Help me, p-please."

Charlie's mouth opened then closed as his brother continued to beg, a horror film brought to life in his backyard. So many wounds. He couldn't be alive yet he spoke. It was nearly worse than him being dead and Charlie trembled with fear. "I...Jason I can't. I...I don't know what to-"

"Charlie...brother...h...help m-me." Jason's form spoke.

Charlie's heart thundered, tears blurring his vision as he knelt in the rain, trying to pull the branch from his brother's form as he began to scream for help from someone- anyone at all. "I don't know what to do!" Charlie screamed at his brother. "I'm only a guy! I don't know what to do!"

And then one last random thought hit him whilst the thunder shook the ground. A thought so ridiculous and inappropriate for such a moment that it made him sick with himself and his own morals.

_If only I was Aaron Stone. And then I would be able to save him. _

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_yeah. I told you it was gruesome. Not much sense to it right now either. I promise it will be clarified in the future if you continue to read which I hope you do. It's always a shame when someone drops a story mid way through. Please review and I promise it will be made clear with coming chapters. _


	7. Riding a Train to Somewhere or Nowhere

**Time to clarify! Sorta. hahaha. truth be told, you wont understand till the next few chapters what's going on. It's no huge twist or anything I promise. I'm not M. Knight Shamalon or anyone like THAT. lollols. AND HERE"S THE TWIST!...psych! There is none...until much later at least. But as well as telling you this I also want to tell you guys that I am apologizing for my last rather gruesome chapter. That's really not like me. I don't ever do that...like EVER but I was in a weird mood. I've got mood swings lately. Been kinda depressed because my boyfriend went away into the Navy on Monday and i've been terrified and wound up and lonely and all sorts of not fun stuff for a girl to deal with. However I always write the most when I'm sad. It helps me a bit. haha.**

SO PLEASE ENJOY AND I"M SORRY FOR THE LAST CHAPIE. It has been edited btw to make it less gory.

_NOTE: This chapter will be dark. Not bad like the last one. Still dark. You've been warned._

_**Read Review and ENJOY!**_

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7

Charlie never took the subway. But no- he _always_ took the subway. How strange it was. He pushed his way through the people around him to get to his stop. He didn't recognize this place at all. It was so dingy and gritty. It was something he would have seen in the city but certainly not his neighborhood and certainly not on his way home from...he didn't know where he had come from actually. He was going... Well he didn't actually know where he was going either.

But no- I _always_ take this subway. I recognize this place _perfectly_. It's-

He brushed his fingers through his hair, bumping into a sturdy bald man. He was short with large curious eyes. Charlie thought for sure he knew a name to go with that face but there was none. He was probably mistaking the man for someone else. After all he didn't personally know anyone that was bald like that. "Sorry, dude. Wasn't looking." He apologized and the man smiled and shrugged.

"Happens. Don't worry about it. Where you headed?"

Charlie lifted his hand. The same one he had run through his hair a moment ago, but he had not run his fingers through his hair at all really now that he thought of it, to look at his ticket. Like magic it was right in his hand where he was so sure it would be. It was blank though. Or it was smudged to say the very least to the point where Charlie couldn't read it for the life of him.

"My dad's office." He said finally when the thought popped into his head. "He's got something to show me real quick before he leaves town on business. Like he had predicted it his phone rang and he took his ticket hand and answered his phone. But no- he hadn't actually had a ticket in his hand to start with. It was a cell phone now that he looked more clearly and he hadn't a clue who the number belonged to.

He knew that number anywhere.

"Hello?" Charlie lifted the phone to his ear, plugging his other with a hand to keep the roaring sounds of the subway out of his head.

"Charlie." There was so much love in that voice. So much compassion there and Charlie's heart swelled in his chest. It was strange. He never felt so coughed up when he was on the phone.

"Dad..." Charlie sniffed.

"Charlie?" The happiness was gone- replaced with concern. "Son, are you alright?"

Charlie shrugged. "Yeah dad, I'm fine. Trouble hearing you though. You gotta speak up. I'm in the station."

"You remember your pass this time? Do you have enough to get home?"

Charlie grinned. " Of course dad, seriously I remember stuff like this." A pause on the opposite line and a grunt told him his father didn't beleive him and Charlie laughed. "Aw pops come on, you're confusing me with Jase. Remember? The lesser of your kids."

His dad laughed at this and the sound made Charlie's eye prickle with tears. "Don't let your mother hear that. You two aren't giving her a hard time while i'm at work, are you?"

"Course not. I spend my time at my job and he spends his terrorizing the couch at home. We're saints."

"I'm sure you are." His dad said before he took a breath on the other line.

"Dad?"

"Sorry, yeah I've got some bad news, Charlie."

Charlie frowned, smile vanishing. "What? What is it?"

"Well kid, it...t..Char-... looks li...-"

Charlie closed his other ear tighter. He couldn't make out a word through the static. "Dad, hey dad you gotta speak up. I can't...dad? Hey are you there?"

"Charl... I'll have to...ck-"

Charlie listened hard but he could only hear the dial tone and he breathed, hanging up the phone and sticking his empty hand into his pocket. He had reached the tracks to the subway and listened to the roar of an approaching train. It was moving fast. He could tell because the whole place had begun to shake. The walls. The ceiling. The lights above his head swayed back and forth and he feared they would fall right down on his head. He looked up with a panic but no one around him seemed to notice or care. They all stood waiting for the subway. A woman reached to cover her baby stroller with a blanket as her husband rested a steady hand on her waist. On Charlie's other side a man checked the time before glancing back up to look for this approaching train. He held his briefcase close and puffed out his chest. Charlie could smell the smoke drifting off the cloths of a group of boys behind him. He heard them whispering but couldn't make out words if they used any. Charlie locked eyes with one of them and the boy grinned to show off a gold pair of teeth before turning back and sitting on the filthy ground with his friends. Where the woman with the baby had been there was a hunched over old woman with a green overcoat. She picked up a quarter off the ground and tucked it away into her pocket.

So many people.

Charlie was alone.

A pit in his stomach told him so.

"Charlie!"

Charlie looked up from his trance to lock eyes with Emma. She stood just on the other side of the tracks, waiting for her own stop. Charlie grinned and waved her way. "Emma! Finally a face I recognize! What are you doing over on that side. Passengers should be over here."

Emma laughed but didn't say anything to answer his question. Instead she hefted her bag up higher on her shoulder and asked her own question. "Charlie, where are you going?"

Charlie opened his mouth to answer her but he was at a loss for words. "Where am I..." He breathed to himself.

The rumbling of the tunnel grew more violent and he looked up. Like the rumble of thunder the subway had to have been immediately close by now.

Behind Emma another passenger came running down the steps. He must have been late. He was sweating and when his hat flew off his head he just barely grabbed it and held it taught as he tried to skip the last few steps. Charlie wished someone would tell him the train wasn't even there yet so he could relax. He was in such a rush though like he planned to run the length of the platform and disappear right through the opposite wall. Nothing seemed to be stopping him from doing just that.

His shoelace is untied.

Charlie noticed it even from the other side of the tracks where he stood. He tripped and Charlie watched all the change he had been holding in his hand scatter all over the ground, some falling into the grating of the floor. Charlie felt fear prick in him when he saw the man falling. He was gonna run right into Emma! If she fell it would be right in the tracks!

"Emma look-" Charlie tried to warn.

She turned and was just in time to catch the man before he fell. She laughed and helped him to his feet, allowing Charlie to take a breath of relief. He didn't know why he was so wound up. He had to relax. It would be fine if he just relaxed.

He looked up the tunnel for the subway as Emma leaned to help the guy collect his change. He watched out of the corner of his eyes. He wondered how she would get on the subway if she was on the derailed side of the track.

The man next to her bent over, reaching for change and was just close enough to her to bump her legs. Charlie's eyes widened as Emma stumbled, let out a shout and fell down into the tracks , laying slightly stunned for a moment there. She blinked and Charlie could see the confusion in her eyes. Her spine arched against the rails and she pushed herself up slightly onto her elbows to try to gain her bearings.

"Emma!" Charlie shouted. He was in a panic but the people around him didn't seem disturbed by the scene at all.

The woman with the baby turned and took her husband's hand.

The business man tapped his foot with anticipation and once again checked his watch.

The boys behind Charlie laughed and picked their teeth.

The hunched old woman adjusted the buttons on her red overcoat.

The man who hd droppd the change straightened his coat and calmly walked back up the stairs like he hadn't meant to be there at all and never was.

Charlie was the only one awake. He took a single step towards the track. The world was shaking around him. The ceiling rained dust on him. The station was trembling so hard with the quake of the train that Charlie fell right off his feet. He sat as the lights appeared in the mouth of the tunnel. Like eyes they drew closer, meaning to swallow up their prey like the gaping mouth of a killer whale. One bite. It would take one bite.

Emma looked up at Charlie for not even a second. "Char-"

And she was gone, sucked under the grinding and crunching wheels of the train. Charlie felt a wetness spray his face and screamed at the blood.

"EMMA!" He shrieked loudly while at the same moment a voice in his head yelled-

"CHACHA!"

_Where am I going?_

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_hahaha. I lied. You don't understand yet. Perhaps in the next chapter you will. In fact I'm certain of it it will become clear in the next one. ^^ Wait and see loves! Please review if you read this. I feel like readers lately are dwindling and I don't want to be a bore. Tell me what you want to see. What you expect to see. What you never wanted to see. Anything. =)_

_REVIEW pleaxe. Next chappie up soon!  
_


	8. Measuring Unidentified

**I feel like every time I post a chapter I have to apologize for how long it's been since I've posted. I feel bad because I know as a reader I hate when that happens. I need to be more constant I know. I've just been busy and school- unfortunately for me- does come first. Highly annoying I know. haha. anyways. This chapter is short and a transition and all those who have read my other stories know how much I HATE transition chapters. We are transitioning. The next chapter is short as well as i've already written it =D but it's better than this one. lols. Then we get into the good stuff after that. **

**Please Enjoy! **

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8

Charlie's head was killing him. He could feel a dampness against his face and his heart was hurting in his chest. It felt ready to pop and he took several deep and trembling breaths as if he had been held underwater for a long time.

He had no clue what it was or what was happening but he knew there was that pain. His brain throbbed. He reached and pinched the bridge of his nose, groaning with agony. It felt like someone had hit him with a shovel and when he told them to stop they hit him again.

"Stop it." He said out loud as if it would make his pain go away.

The shovel hit him again and then spoke to him. "Chacha needs to get up now!"

Charlie blinked past the fog in his head just in time to see Demo hovering over him, drawing back to bash against him once more. He put his hands up quickly to stop her, eyes widening. "Demo, stop! I'm awake!" He insisted. He felt strange. His head was spinning and more than anything he wanted to close his eyes and go back to sleep. He didn't want to risk getting hit once more by the small bot though so instead he just sat upright and leaned his head back against the wall.

"Chacha should not be sleeping here." Demo insisted, the little lights on her face brightening with the emphasis. "It is not safe for Chacha to sleep for so long."

So long? What did she mean by that? He had just nodded off after...

Charlie thought back. Now that he thought of it- he didn't even remember sitting down to rest. He didn't remember closing his eyes or even deciding he wanted to rest in the first place. But here he was curled against the ground under a very nervous Demo telling him he had been out for quite some time. His nose crinkled up and he forced himself to his feet. The world spun around him as he did and gravity seemed to work against him. It did not want him getting up. Sit back down. Rest. Sleep Charlie.

He shook his head, his mind playing tricks on him. This was ridiculous. He had never felt this exhaustion before, why now?

Demo's gears beeped and buzzed and he glanced at her. "Demo... something's wrong here." He mumbled.

The bot seemed to pick up on his discomfort immediately and she whirled closer to his face. "Something wrong. Not safe for humans." She repeated. She paused and a vent opened like blinds in the bottom of her round figure. The lights on her face disappeared from the normal face and instead a loading bar appeared, slowly lighting up as the seconds passed.

"Measuring...measuring... measuring..." Demo's voice squeaked out automatically. Charlie had a bizarre feeling that she wasn't really in there as she loaded whatever it was she was testing. It sure was taking a long time for whatever it was. He leaned against a wall and shut his eyes just to pass the time. "Results..." Demo chirped loud enough to jar Charlie from his semi-sleep. "Results: Chacha should not sleep."

Charlie shook his head. Right then things weren't making any sense at all. Why did Demo wake him. Why was sleeping not safe? He blinked at her, a scowl growing on his face. Above him the ceiling trembled and the ground shook under his feet. There was a rumble from somewhere distant and he braced himself for a moment till it passed. Whatever it was- he had no clue. It was a problem for another time.

"Demo- tell me why it's not safe to sleep."

Demo hesitated while her answer complied to his words and Charlie waited impatiently. "Air unpure." Demo said as her face reappeared on the screen. "Unidentified fragments polluting human oxygen. Unsafe. Untested."

Charlie breathed. "Unidentified. Then you have no clue what's going on?"

"Demo knows it not safe. Demon knows Chacha has been effected by human polluted oxygen. Chacha sleeps for long time. Chacha should no longer sleep."

The tunnel rumbled once more and fragments of rock clattered down from the ceiling. Charlie tensed and craned his neck to look up at the unstable roof above him. Perhaps this wasn't a problem for another time. Perhaps this was a problem for _now_.

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bleh. i know. me too. didn't so much enjoy this one besides the fact that it's setting Chacha up for some problems later. haha. And what is that rumbling sound? =D stay tuned lovers!


	9. Rumble, Rumble, Rumble CRASH!

**Longer chapter! Picking up a bit because ive got SAT prep and I can type during that class. Since ive got cheerleading, drama and gymnastics and dance on most days I've been out of the house at 5am and back home at 10pm every night. Its been tough but I found if I type during class at school I can get more chapters quicker. ^^ So despair not and whoever is still here reading with me-THANK YOU AND I LOVE YOU!**

**PS- Thanx to everyone whos been reviewing. Especially my new reviewers! It makes me feel really happy to know everyones thoughts and input! I get so excited seeing new names! Thanks very much you guys! Cookies for you! =D  
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**Read, review and Enjoy all you lovers! ^^**

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9

The rumbling above and in Charlie's chest was enough to break the Richter scale. The tunnels around hum shook and trembled to mirror the fear and terror in the hero's gut. Still half asleep- he was tied down by his grogginess. Yet he couldn't get himself to wake up. The impending danger of the unsteady stone around him loomed on his shoulders yet his mind was too dark and clouded.

Charlie was exhausted. He had been walking all day through the darkness and his complete sense of time had gone up and left him long ago. He could barely tell which way was up and down in the blackness. He could have been treading through water and not even notice. So lost he was in his mind and body that Demo's light in front of him was the only reason he hadn't passed out or simply gone insane two thousand steps ago. AS it was he was running strictly on fumes.

He took in a raspy gasp and felt his knees fold out under him. He didn't even notice he had fallen till he heard Demo call his name in front of him and whiz down to hover by his ear. He pressed a palm against the wall next to him, trying to force himself to push up onto his feet again and off his knees. The bruises on his legs hurt when his pure weight pressed him into the stone but he didn't move. Why was he so tired? He hadn't done anything strenuous. Or at least he didn't remember it if he had. The spider sure had taken some out of him but not this much.

And yet...

Charlie shook his head when Demo started talking. He didn't hear her words. His shoulder was hurting him somewhere distant but he didn't process it in his mind enough to grit his teeth against it or to moan with the agony he was sure he was feeling in some part of him.

"...can not be your mother but I really can try if thats what you need. I will assist you in any way but even so Demo is not a human being and does not have thumbs like silly humans and apendiges. I am not strong. I cannot carry human Chacha long. Demo is not made for physical attributes. I am a brain. I speak languages and translate for silly human minds programmed to only speak single language at birth. Such inconvenience for poor humans but Demo can do so to help such faults but physical is not what Demo is made for. If Tetra thought it right he would have given you Pak2p to assist you. Pak2p is always so good with physical work. He is built so. Pak2p knows how to adjust to such strenuous environments but Demo cannot. Demo does not be able to help you. Please, Chacha understands. Please not deprogram me. I do my best to assist where I can."

Charlie blinked past the bot's words and her excuses as to why she couldn't help. He listened when she described the other robot and for a split second he wondered why Tetra had not sent him with this stronger robot Pak2p or whatever his name was. He could really have used another hand in this matter right then of all times.

"I'm just tired is all." Charlie mumbled to the bot. "I dunno what it is. It just hit me." Charlie shook his head, trying to wake himself. He didn't even remember when the exhaustion had hit him. He had been fine after the spider attack and even several miles later he knew he was still alright. Yet however long or short ago he just felt like collapsing.

What problem would there be to go right back to sleep? What was really holding him back in the first place? After all- he was so very tired. He rested a hand against the wall as his feet carried him forward but the soft humming of Demo's gears were hypnotizing. Without even realizing - he was being lulled to sleep.

So tired.

He took a deep breath. He didn't know where Demo thought whatever was in the air had to be a bad thing. To him the air was sweet and thick. It was like strawberries and cream or fresh syrup on blueberry pancakes. It was warm and inviting and he took another deep breath.

His lips were cracked and split and his stomach more or less empty besides the survival packs and shots of proteins Demo carried with her at all times, but the air in the tunnel seemed enough to feed his deprived body. How could it be a bad thing?

His eyes fluttered shut in time to miss the next tremor that ran the length of the tunnel. The stone ceiling above rumbled and several stones clattered onto the ground just to the left of his resting head. Before him- the bot stopped and spun around, whirring and chirping in panic to see her master once again nodding off into a world where she could not follow.

"Chacha!" Demo called, trying her best to keep him awake. She saw his eyes flutter, movement there. She was programmed to know the signs of a human. The flutter of the eyelids. The rise and fall of the chest. A twitch of the finger. Eyes rolling behind closed flaps of skin. She knew as well as the next computer how close Charlie was to semi- consciousness. "Idiot human must continue forward! Stupid human being must wake up!" She buzzed, the lights on her face changing from a soft blue to an orange. Charlie's eyes fluttered more and she was programmed to know he was awake when her monitors picked up an increased heart rate. "Demo will not fail Tetra! Demo will make Chacha live!"

Still, Charlie didn't stand and Demo made a grinding noise in the bottom of her circular chambers. "Demo is impatient, Chacha. Demo do so much for silly human. Demo apologizes in advance for this. But Demo sees no other options in this dilemma. Excuse me." A wire protruded from her right side, the tip barred with a metallic prong. It buzzed silently despite a rather plain look when she touched the tip very lightly into the exposed flesh of Charlie's neck.

Demo had never seen the human move so impossibly quick in her whole time with him. Eighty nine hours, forty-five minutes, twenty eight...nine...thirty seconds and fifteen milliseconds to be roughly exact. His body jerked and for a moment her program was confused, the screen filling with static behind her lenses when she could not compute the human motions of his. When his body returned to a more natural standing point he blurred back into view and all her scanners flickered back to life at once.

_**Pulse: Elevated**_

_**Brain Signals: Average/slightly abnormal**_

_**Eyes: Dilated**_

_**Emotional Discharge: Anger/ Irritation/Annoyance/Confusion**_

_**CLEAR SYSTEM REPORT-**COMPLETE_

"What the hell was that?" Charlie shouted at the bot and Demo took a moment to process his shouting before blurting out her cheerful-

"Demo already took time to warn Chacha not to sleep. Ceiling is unstable. Chacha is unsafe. Time for moving. Walk. Walk. Walk!" She began hovering forward once more and Charlie rolled his eyes stepping in behind turned a corner and Charlie blinked into the opening of a new hallway. The ceiling was in chunks and cracks ran the length of the tunnel. All along the ground it was severely blemished with obstacles- rocks and pieces of the tunnel having fallen to create craters and mountains in the ground.

Charlie took a breath. "Demo- is this really the only way to get the the center of this place?"

"Is the only way. Destination weary human. We are close."

Charlie was afraid to breath again after he took his first step. It seemed no one had walked through the passage in decades and his feet were only disturbing the peace. It seemed even his breath would shake loose the rocks overhead and he held it when he walked.

If his mind was on the sleep before, he was wired now. The grogginess was there but the adrenaline of danger kept him moving and kept him fearful. A clump of dust and rock fell from the ceiling. It wasn't nearly enough to worry Charlie and he relaxed after it hit the ground in a puff of dust and dirt. He was fine. He was okay.

Demo was not. Her venting system sucked in a wad of the dust and he listened when her gears began to grind and her systems automatically began rumbling to clean her system out. She sputtered and whirred as her programs were taught to keep her safe and in top condition. Yet the need to clean her system was enough to disturb the balance of their surroundings?

Charlie tilted his head back to look up but none of the rocks had moved. Perhaps it was more stable than he had thoughts.

Then like before- the tunnels began to rumble and there was a deadly cracking and snapping sound from above. Charlie wrapped an arm around Demo and ran as fast as he could when the roof opened up and a thousand tons of rock fell down on them.

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_Wows! That's a lot of rock. Hope Charlie's awake now. XD RUN CHARLIE RUN! _

_Thanx for reading! More coming soon as I have another SAT prep class! =D Review and I promise the chapies'll come faster!_


	10. Visitors, Visitors, Pick Them Apart

**NEXT CHAPTER UP! So I suppose we've left Charlie dodging a cave in this whole time. Poor guy must be tired by now. Whaddaya say we let him out finally, eh? haha**

** Nearing an end. What will happen now?**

**READ REVIEW AND ENJOY!**

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10

The faint pulsating of Charlie's heart in his chest was the only way he knew he was alive. His eyes opened but all was black. It swam to a dim sort of yellow and then faded once again, keeping time with every other breath. He considered trying to move but his mind was so distant from him. He was so groggy and he had a gut feeling that trying to move would only hurt. At that moment he felt nothing. A nice and comforting numbness had washed over him and he was at peace.

He recalled the cave in. The rumbling of the tunnel just before a thousand tons of stone crumbled over his head. He could feel the grains and dirt caked against his skin and under his fingernails. He could still feel the pressure of the stones crushing his body.

When the first stone hit him...

When he realized he was dead...

His arm had gone around the small bot Demo. She was making the most awful noises and he knew that perhaps she was not programed to fully understand what was happening around them. Charlie got the feeling that she was aware of the danger but not so much at the reality of where it was coming from. She was hard to haul and fought him the whole way, a buzzing whirring noise as she not only tried to clean out her systems but translate the actions presented in this new environment. Whatever she was doing- it was not helping Charlie gain the distance he needed from where he was standing under the rock to a safer tunnel several strides ahead of him.

He could very well have let her go. It would have given him that chance to escape himself if he had taken that arm away from her and just looked out for himself. But he couldn't force himself to. Even as he realized the only way he would escape was to fend for himself. She was just a computer after all. Not really a life. She could probably be reprogrammed into a different body as easily as it was to download a program to a desktop. His arm stayed tight around her and when the thought of letting go came to mind it only tightened.

It was Jason's fault.

His brother was slowly eating away at his mind. The memory of him those seconds before Charlie had become an only child. Those moments where Charlie couldn't stop blaming himself from letting his brother go. That was exactly what he had done. He had let Jason go too soon and because of it his brother was dead.

Dead because Charlie wasn't looking out for him. Dead because Charlie wasn't strong enough. Dead because Charlie hadn't cared enough.

And here was Demo- this little robot. No mind or soul but so very much human in ways that confused the hero. She was his companion. She was his savior in the sand of the desert and she was his voice of reason when he lost all of his. When the madness took control and he had nothing left to work on but the movements of his determined feet. A light in the darkness suffocating his mind and to let her go now. To let Jason go again after Charlie had already failed to protect him once. Charlie could not see his brother die again. Not so soon. He would hold onto Jason all the way through the tunnel and even when the larger and more deadly rocks begin to fall he would still hold tight to his brother. Because Jason deserved better. Because if Jason were alive Charlie wouldn't trust himself to ever let go again.

He hadn't even realized the tears streaming from his eyes when he ran. The blurriness of the tunnel. It might have been for that same reason that he did not see the stone ricochet off a wall and smack the side of his face with a dull crack. He lay down. An arm tight still around Demo who was letting out a siren like sort of wail in the rumbling. AS if the louder she was the more chance there was of a miracle happening. Like someone would hear her all the way out here a thousand miles from civilization and rescue them before the mountain fell.

And the mountain did fall. Every stone was another load, crushing Charlie's bones. Making his ribs creak in protest even as he lay helpless under it. His face was pressed flat to the ground, a sliver of stone and grains of sand breaking the skin of his cheeks and printing him with freckles. He knew he was dead even before he blacked out, too low on oxygen from the crushing force of the rocks pressing in on him. Small ones as they were, lucky enough to have dodged the brute of the larger ones. They murdered him gently and for this he was thankful. He was given that one moment to think. To apologize to his mother and his friends back home. To close his eyes and wait patiently to open them again but this time without pain. And to see his little baby brother standing before him with that goofy grin. He was okay with that. He would be alright. If this was the end then he was alright to accept it now. Now that he had nothing left to live for but his regrets and guilt.

The regrets he was feeling now that he was alive. The same tears that had blurred his vision in the tunnel clouded his eyes and the sticky dried paths on his face were softened with fresh droplets. Alive. He was still alive. He couldn't decide if this was good or bad. Good because he could still save his brother. Bad because he was just so tired of everything. Tired of running. Tired of fighting. Tired of being a hero.

And how had this happened in the first place? He was brave enough to tilt his head to the side, his vision swimming and his ears picking up noises that sounded like they were being whispered through cotton. He was so far away. Why was he so far away? And who did that voice belong to?

He tried to blink open his eyes. He was so sleepy right then. Across the room from him he could see Demo. She was set on the stone floor of what seemed like a small chamber. The words STAND BY flickered on and off across her face and a small box was attached to her panels. Foreign wires running to her circuits.

"Demo?" He breathed. His throat hurt and he coughed in pain. His lips cracked when he tried to move them to form more words.

So the voice he was hearing did not belong to his companion. Then who was rambling? Or who had been rambling before? The psychotic gibberish and rantings he couldn't decipher had stopped as soon as he had tried to speak to say Demo's name. Now there was silence.

Charlie tried to lift his arms. He was unnerved by the quiet and at the idea that someone else was in this small enclosed chamber with him. Someone he could not see. His wrists stung when he pulled and he saw with a thundering heart that he was secured down with stringy and rough ropes. They looked home made, wound and coiled into a single tight strand out of what could have been anything Charlie's imagination made it out to be.

As his vision grew clearer he scanned the room, still not completely taken by the fact that he was tied down- a prisoner to someone he couldn't see. It was lit with what looked like glowing clay pots. Upon further inspection he realized he had seen them once before in a science textbook. Back when he was studying electricity and the earliest ages of it. Some people had said that the first power was not in fact created when a key was strapped to a kite but built hundreds of years before out of citrus and copper. And these was exactly the same pots he had seen on the waxy pages in a boring text.

The light was dim but lit the chamber just enough. There was a stone table scattered with sharpened and shined razors and stones. Scalpels and coils and all sorts of things that made Charlie shiver. A coppery brown stained the floor and the table Charlie lay on and he felt his heart begin to pound. Blood. Dried blood. From who or what he had no clue but laying where he was he had a sick feelings eating its way to his brain. His position finally sank in and he tugged hard at the ropes, feeling them strain under the pressure but hold fast. He panted as he pulled, nerves on fire now but at the same time still very sleepy. He didn't understand. He should have been filled with adrenaline that very moment but instead he sort of wanted to lean over and take a nap. It concerned him and he began to wonder what Demo had found in the air exactly so deep into this tunnel. What was down here that made him so-

"Two little creatures climb into the dark. Crawling and creeping they claw. Invading my palace and spoiling my home. Ripping and tearing and breaking they roam. Like little bugs that must be squashed. Or better yet- picked apart."

Charlie shifted, a rattling and quick sounding voice echoing over his shoulder. He wished he could look back to see. But he had little room to move his head and he was still in so much pain. His whole body had to be broken from the cave in.

"Who's there?" He called, trying to keep the strain out of his voice and the nerves out of his head.

"Visitors. Visitors asking questions. Visitors demanding names from me. Pesty visitors asking petty things."

Charlie listened, fear rising in him as this mad stranger began to walk. Or it may have been walking. It sounded more like something hard and heavy being dragged across the stone floor by force. An eye watering stank filled Charlie's nose as it drew closer and he coughed as the noise stopped, so close to him. It was so close. The smell was painful. The pause even worse for torture.

Then the gray stretched face of a dead man, jaw hanging slack and teeth eroded near out of its skull leaned out in front of him and stared into his face with two faded white eyes. "You will behave, my pet."

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_This was a fun chapter to write. I really like my new character. Hes kinda fun. We get to see a whole lot of him in the next chapter. Btw- next chapie is gonna be intense. Gonna get to see a side to charlie we don't always see. Stick around and find out! =D Please review. I need input on things. It gets me going to write more sooner. Every word counts._ =)


	11. Shutting Down

**Okeeeee. Heres a nice and long one just for you! Make up for my untimely writing. lols...this chapter is intense near the end. O.o we will see something new here. Youv all been waiting for it. You just didn't know when. Thats all I'll say- please enjoy. This isn't too graphic btw. I promise. It's just...intense. You'll see why.**

**Please READ REVIEW AND ENJOY!^^**

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11

Charlie's heart had never beat so fast in his entire life. He could feel his blood pumping through his veins and he felt a tremor run the length of his body. The stench of death was all in the air and it was all he could do not to gag. His skin crawled. This smell. This feeling he got just sitting in the presence of his kidnapper was enough to make him want to turn and run. Something he might have considered had he not been tied down. But then there was always Jason calling him back. It was always Jason.

He bit his lip against the stench, arching his head away as the man over him leaned in closer- if he could even be called a man. He didn't seem very much human in that moment. He seemed more like a monster- something that should have and could have been dead a very long time ago and was still clawing at the earth, never letting go. Charlie had never been one to play zombie based video games. He was pretty much a dedicated Hero Rising fanatic. He knew next to nothing about Zombies. Only that they probably looked alot like this...this thing did right now. That...and that they died with head shots.

Charlie shivered again but this time for a different reason. He could still hear Tetra in his head ordering him to kill Runihura. It didn't seem fair to order such a thing out of him. But was it really the only way to get the antidote? Charlie had doubted it before. He was so certain that the so called evil scientist Tetra was so against would allow him to take enough to save his brother. Who wouldn't? Charlie was desperate. How could any living soul say no? But this man was not living. Or he should not have been living. How tightly he valued the antidote running through his bloodstream was something Charlie had no actual idea of.

"Runihura..." Charlie breathed finally- bravely turning his eyes to lock with the two deep pits that belonged to his brother's fate.

The head turned to the side, tilting quickly enough to have given him whip lash. Charlie heard the bones crack in his neck and he opened and closed a hanging jaw in curiosity and confusion. Charlie's heart sped again. This was a horror movie. He was in a nightmare.

"Little beasty knows my name. Beasty has a reason to have came. Runihura is not interested."

Charlie swallowed as the man stepped back on his heals and dragged himself to one of the counters in the small chamber. He fiddled with a scalpel as he mumbled to himself. Charlie took a breath. "Runihura, I need to-"

"Do you know that there are actually twenty three chromosomes in the human body? Twenty three pairs. How many does that make us? That makes us forty six. Forty six little pieces of little living things. Swimmy things that build us up and create us to be who we be. Humans have never thanked our little things. Little things that creates us. Makes us who we are. We never are grateful. Dangerous, vile, hateful. Creatures. Creatures. Creatures. Little beasty things are we. Little beasty things not me. YOU!"

Charlie swallowed. He didn't have time for this. He knew in his head that he had all the time in the world. Jason wasn't going anywhere. But the longer he was there it felt as if the farther away his chances were getting. He needed to end this. He needed to see his home again and his mom and Stan and his friends. He needed Emma and he needed Buznik... no... not Percy. Percy reminded him of what had happened. But he needed everyone else. He needed everything else that was his past before all this mess had happened. It was the first time he had admitted it to himself and his chest constricted. He missed it. He missed all of it. He missed Charlie.

"I have a favor. Please. I came a long way to ask-"

"Of the antidote I know. And don't you make excuses to tell me so. I know. I know. I always know."

While he was speaking he seemed distracted, still fiddling with the tools and needles on his counter top. He snatched up a blade, impossibly thin like a needle from the side but when tilted it was wide and slanted, made for precision.

"Charlie breathed slowly. "How did you know I came for the-"

"Why else would you have come? Certainly not to greet me. Certainly not to meet me. You have not stolen treasure and this meeting does not bring you pleasure." Much faster than Charlie had ever seen the old man move, he was standing next to him, feeling his pulse against Charlie's exposed wrist, still tied down roughly. "Elevated pulse, you are fearful. No- not fearful as your eyes lock with mine. Nervous. Anxious. Impatient. You know as well as I do inside your head that I will not give you what you came for. You have wasted your time."

Charlie bit down hard on his tongue by accident and tasted the salty copper tang of blood. He wouldn't give him the- but why? Tetra had warned him about this. He had said he wouldn't give him the antidote and here he was refusing him. Was the only way to get it really force?

"Don't you see why it cannot be? Humans. Humans. Creatures. Slow. Unworthy beings. This planet is wasted in their filth. The Gods surely regret. The creating of humans is the worst decision yet. And you do not see. These bad choices you want to dive into. You cannot see past... who is it you are bringing back from the dead?"

"My broth-"

"Your brother is no longer living. Move on and let him pass. It was meant to be. Meant to be and you do not see. Life and death. Regret. Regret. Tsk. Tsk. For the living idiots."

Charlie didn't like this. He didn't like the way Runihura went on as if he was no longer human himself. Charlie had been banking on the fact that no soul could have turned down bringing his brother back to him. Yet this man seemed to lack one all together. He was a shell of a human. Nothing on the inside and even if a heart did beat in there it was broken and not capable to feel compassion as normal humans did.

"But you don't understand me. Simpleton. Simple minded idiot. Do not see where I come from."

He lifted the blade he had been holding, icy cold hands grasping the side of Charlie's face none too gently. He didn't mean to be rough but Charlie had the feeling he had not had contact with another human in quite some time. He dragged the blade softly along Charlie's brow line and then down to his jaw, up the front of his face. It wasn't enough to cut the skin but Charlie could feel the cold metal sliding along his flesh and his breathing stuttered to a halt for a moment as he watched his own reflection betray his fears back to him, mirrored in the side of the razor.

"How could I make you see?" The man continued softly, voice rasping only slightly now as if talking of this subject eased his mind and body from its eternal suffering. He dragged the blade and applied some pressure next to Charlie's temple with his thumb. Charlie had to press his head hard backwards to avoid contact with the blade, only a skin away from his eye. "Shall I take an eye? Replace it with something that can help your vision?" He lifted some of Charlie's hair off his forehead with the razor. "Or should I replace the brain? Perhaps the medicine has had too much of an effect on you. You are too weak to take it? Maybe you came in learned and only just reached me corrupted. Meddled with by my tests. Results. Results finally. So very timely."

"Medicine…" Charlie whispered. The particles Demo had noticed in the air. It was created by Runihura for what… a test?

"Always testing. Testing is what scientists do. What else is down here for me to accomplish. Ever searching for knowledge. Knowledge to be taken away from one living thing to the next. A brighter tomorrow for another day."

"That's enough-" Charlie mumbled. He couldn't listen to this any more. It was killing him to be here and a sick feeling hit him in the gut.

"Wouldn't you die to hear of my achievements? Of my life and curse? Of how living forever is a marvelous thing? Living forever and ever and ever and ever and ever and ever and ever and…." He paused as if he had lost his train of thought but continued a moment later. "But living without dreams. You did not know that did you? Living forever but aspiring nothing. Wanting nothing. Only to test. Because in my gut I know that is what is best. I know I succeed with such things so things is what I do. But never dream. Never wish. And it is this that made me test. Test a medicine to give me dreams. Test an antidote to fix me. But I do not need fixing so I use you. Tell me true- what dreams do you have? For certainly I have had none. It is failed for me but perhaps not for some?"

Charlie shivered. These terrible nightmares he was having were all because he had been testing. Testing to create dreams because he couldn't. The thought hit him hard not because he felt any pity for the man but more due to the fact that he would be bringing Jason back into the same world. Would Jason dream? Would he aspire and wish like he always did? Would he hope? Or would he come back a shell? Charlie felt his body tremble. Jason becoming this was nearly more harsh a thought then Jason being dead. He would be curing his brother for all eternity. But no- Tetra had said that Jason would not live forever. He would only be back from the dead so why was Charlie so afraid. Maybe he was just thinking to hard into this. Maybe… but maybe not. God, this was the hardest thing Charlie had ever done and his head throbbed painfully.

Runihura had left his side and stepped back to his countertop. He set down the thin blade and took up a scalpel, rusted on the handle but impossibly shiny as if it were new.

"You have to listen to me." Charlie breathed, voice cracking. "My brother… he… he wasn't supposed to die he… I mean it was my fault. I was supposed to protect him and I pulled him into something that I couldn't handle and. Please- you have to let me bring him back. I can't just sit and do nothi-"

"How do you know of me?" He interrupted before Charlie could finish.

Charlie felt his throat get hot and thick. He couldn't per sway him. He wasn't even listening. "A Computer. Tetra."

"TETRAAAAAaaaaa!"

He was listening now. His scream echoed throughout the entire chamber as the man dragged his arm over his countertop, scattering his torture devices all throughout the chamber. He tossed a stone and shattered a light, darkening the room a bit and casting terrible shadows over his deathly face.

"Tetra sent you! That evil! That demon! If I have ever made a mistake in my life! Kill it! Destroy the corrupt and he traps me! My own creating! Trapping a GOD! Like trapping a master! ME!"

Charlie hadn't even seen him move but suddenly he was next to him, holding the scalpel against his wrist. He sliced the ties that bound Charlie in his rage, meaning to slit Charlie's veins but having to get through the ties first.

"END THE TRICKERY!" He shrieked, voice impossibly piercing. Charlie felt a hot sensation flood his arm as the blade made contact with his skin. He was just in time to yank his hand back, saving himself from all but a small cut. Any longer and he would have been missing a hand.

Charlie swung his legs off the table, his arm bending awkwardly when his other hand did not come untied. Without a second thought in his head, he reached for a blade on the floor, intercepted when Runihura lunged for his throat, swiping with the blade. Charlie ducked as best he could while still tied and the man missed, using his good arm, Charlie hit him with everything he had, fearful now as his gauntlet were gone, taken off somewhere before he had gained consciousness. He reached again for a blade, desperate to free himself. His fingers closed on the blade and he swiped it over his bounds. He had no time to cut them all through but he was freed enough to yank away from them, the roped breaking in time for him to roll out of the way of his attacker. For an old man and a sight of the afterlife, he moved as quick as a snake and when a fist found its way to Charlie's face and Charlie saw stars in his eyes, he knew he was a lot stronger as well.

"You think you can fight me? I have been living for eternity! You are a new born! Nothing!"

Charlie hopped over the stone counter, trying to put distance between himself and Runihura. He was too fast- too strong. He ducked behind the counter, fingers closing on a longer blade than the one he had used to free himself. He abandoned the other one, lost somewhere in the struggle.

"I don't want to fight you!" Charlie shouted. "I don't want to kill you!"

"Kill me! Kill me! Human toddler wants to kill me! Tetra is mad to send you! I shall end you!"

He heard a hissing croak and the man slid over the counter, landing on Charlie's back. Charlie struggled to get him off as the man's cold hands grasped his ears, yanking his head backwards to expose his neck. Charlie was sure he'd feel the ice of a blade and struggled hard, snapping an elbow back and hearing a clatter when the man dropped his weapon. He didn't go to retrieve it. Instead- dull teeth snapped shut on Charlie's neck, knowing till he broke the skin.

Charlie screamed in more shock then pain. He'd bitten him! Like an animal he bit him! "You're insane!" Charlie screamed, thrusting backwards and crushing Runihura between himself and the stone wall again and again till he let go. Charlie stumbled to his feet but those arms were too fast, grasping him and pulling him down. Charlie felt the broken clay under him of the broken light, felt it crunch against his spine when Runihura pinned him down, lifting a screw- like twisting blade over his head and aiming for Charlie's heart.

Charlie lifted a hand to block his face like maybe it would keep him safe, grasping Runihura's blade hand before it could strike him and holding him with everything he had at bay. But for how long?

And there is was- right in front of him, the thing he had been trying not to look at for days now. The brown stain under his fingernails. It was deep and embedded, reddened by fresher blood when he had tried so violently to rid himself of it. Jason's blood. Caught under his fingers as a reminder. How long until it went away? Till his nails grew out and he could wash it down the drain to never see it again?

His brother's blood. His dead brothers blood. His dead baby brother who had counted so much on him. He had trusted him with his life. His brother who he had lost because he hadn't been strong enough. Because he was an idiot human as Runihura had said. Pain flashed in Charlie's chest but Runihura had not struck yet. It was his heart shutting off. It refused to beat anymore for to beat would be to fuel the fire inside him. It would fuel the pain and Charlie did not need any more of that. The tears that had been flowing as he first spotted the rusty colors staining his fingers stopped all at once. His breathing came back calm and even. He was done with all this. He was done feeling this pain and torment. Just everything. It was all done.

Charlie had never felt so strong in his life. He snapped Runihura's wrist backwards, heard the bones crack and heard the man grunt. Then he stole the blade, lips snarling into his rage and struck true.

Runihura- after centuries and centuries, died there by the hands of an innocent man.

Charlie did not tremble when he stood up. There was no satisfaction. There was no joy. There was no pain. There was no guilt. No regret for taking his very first life. He was a hero but had anyone been watching then they would not have seen Aaron Stone- the good and just. He was something very different. And was that what Chronis had seen in him what felt like a lifetime ago? When Charlie had been so close to killing to save his brother?

And now he had done it. He had lifted the blade and done what he swore to himself he had never do. And how many more times would this happen? How many more would he sacrifice to save the ones he truly cared about? He didn't know or care. Because he was shutting down. Just like a computer. Like Tetra programmed to do whatever he saw fit. Like Demo was programmed to follow a master. Charlie was programming himself for the better or worse- who could really say?

Despite his programming he still had a task to accomplish. He took out his vial and drained Runihura of his antidote. He was going to bring his brother back. But then- would that be enough to bring Aaron Stone back as well?

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_Only one more chapter in this story. Its gonna be really REALLY good so stay tuned people for the finale. I hope you liked this one. It leads into everything else that is ever going to happen so hope you enjoyed it. =) Lets see how things shape up- shall we? I mean- we kinda left everything at an odd point in A Silent Hero. Perhaps it's time to see whats happening at home? =) Hope you liked all this. One more chapter! Working quick on it! REVIEW!_


	12. Growing Up Stupid and Immature

**Just because this is the last chapter doesn't mean you shouldn't review! If anything it should make you review more! lols. This chapter was fun to right and actually was the very first chapter of this story that I wrote. haha. yeps. I tend to write everything backwards. XD My previous story fans know that. haha. I love this chapter however and I hope you do too. Some stuff in here we've never seen before. Lets all watch as Charlie changes before our eyes. It seems he is scarred for life. What kind of person is he now? And how will it effect his job?**

**Read, Review and Enjoy! =)**

**Warning: language in this chapter. Thats all. haha**

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12

The world was upside down. It had been two weeks since Charlie, Percy and Jason had been lost in the forest and one since Percy had witnessed Jason's death. He was dead! He had seen it himself! When Percy had been rescued he had been alone. Stumbling around and clearly hallucinating. He insisted he had seen Charlie fighting- almost like Aaron Stone in Hero Rising. In fact- it was just like Hero Rising.

And he had seen Jason die. That was the main thing he brought up. Jason was dead.

Mrs. Landers was more than a little bit hysterical. Her sons were still out there missing. Jason was announced dead. Missing though. The body had not been found. And her heart had been ripped out. All she could think of was Charlie and if she had no one left. Jason. Her little baby Jason. Her little boy was dead. She just wouldn't believe it. She was sick with depression. She couldn't take it if he was… but no- until there was a body she couldn't fall down that path. And Charlie. Her Charlie baby was still out there as well. She could never forgive Percy for leaving her boys out there alone. Why had he been alone when he was rescued? How come they weren't together?

Of course- when her boys turned up in the hospital things were all cleared. Percy was insane. Fighting? Shooting? A gaming gauntlet and mini electric monsters? He was clearly sick. The moment Charlie returned home in one piece Percy was shipped to a therapist. They said he was mentally scarred. The terrors of his near death experience making his sanity questionable. Nothing he said was trustworthy at this point.

Jason seemed untouched. He was out of it in the worst way- in fact he hadn't said a single word since he had showed up, leaned over his older brother's shoulder like a sack. But he wasn't bruised. Wasn't cut. Wasn't hurt in any way- while Charlie seemed to have gotten the brute of it. He was cut and beaten, a black eye and needed several stitches in a slashed shoulder. The strange part was there was no frost bite. Percy had come in with toes and ears blackened with cold. Charlie seemed to be the very opposite- suffering from terribly painful sunburn and blisters. It didn't make any sense at all.

Charlie didn't explain either. How could they expect him to say anything? Not even Emma. Not even Stan. No one knew. He hoped no one ever would. He didn't want to go there. And by the dead look in his eyes no one tried to ask him. He had been as silent as his little brother till he had been freed from the hospital. He had said a few words to his mother- telling her he was alright and not to worry any more. Jason seemed more talkative to her but a bit shocked. Charlie had not had a single chance to talk to him alone but once or twice he had locked eyes with his little brother and in them he saw… nothing. When he finally had the chance to say a word to him about his death and resurrection- Jason had looked at him with the same confusion as would a new born. He didn't know. Didn't remember a thing. All he remembered was going on the field trip and waking up in Charlie's trembling arms, suffocated in his protective grasp. All he knew was the fear in his gut he had felt when his brother gripped so fearfully- as if he would never let go ever again and he wondered what had happened.

Life went on. Charlie went to school and the rumors and excitement died down like everything always did. He avoided Emma. He locked his door so Stan couldn't see him. The gaming console gathered dust next to his computer. When he was with his brother he watched and never went near. It was Charlie- but he wasn't really there. Not to anyone watching. To anyone who didn't know, which was everyone, he was just in shock from the experience. But on the inside he was fine. He was perfectly alright. Even as the idea began to arise that maybe Charlie needed the same therapy as Percy. Even then he was more sane than he had ever been. No one understood. But he knew and he was decided.

When he packed his bags that night he didn't mean to move so slowly. It seemed that as decided as he was on this- it would never make things any easier. He knew what was best. He couldn't rethink this. He had nearly killed his brother. No. He had killed his brother. He had killed his baby brother one too many times. He had broken his mothers heart enough for one life. He had put everything he loved on the line and for what? For his own selfish job. And he was done with it. His mother didn't need this weight. Jason didn't need this responsibility. He needed to get out.

He set the note on Jason's bedside table. It would be better for Jason to find it and then tell their mother. It was easier this way. He was fast asleep- calm. Charlie swallowed hard. He wondered if his baby brother was dreaming. He had been so unlike himself since Charlie had brought him back. Charlie remembered every second. He recalled bringing the vial out of the chamber, the rush he felt and then Tetra was there. He seemed so much stronger than before and didn't flicker out of view like he had before. And he was in the real world! Not that white nothingness he had said he was trapped in. It seemed through Runihura's death- Tetra was freed. It was a scary thing but Charlie didn't care to take note of the dark change in the computer. And when Jason's eyes opened, blue and bright- filled with confusion, Charlie had forgotten to care about anything else but holding his brother tight.

But he didn't forget now. The warning he had received about the antidote. Could Jason still dream? Could he still hope? Was that the same brother he had always loved in there?  
He frowned, reaching to brush some of his baby brother's dark hair away from his eyes. Jason shifted in his sleep, head rolling to the side. The blue lights of the moon shining down on his pale skin.  
Charlie's breath caught. He loved Jason so much. The best little brother he could ever have. And this was the reason he had to leave.

He was back in his room a moment later. The stairs would creak. His mom would know he was up. Or Stan would awake and stop him. Too risky. He needed to get out. His window cooperated with him as if it agreed he should leave. He slid out onto the roof, sighing as he breathed in the night air. This was the last time he would see this place. The last time he would have this life. Now or never.

"Charlie?"

Charlie's heart stopped. How could he face that voice? He turned, eyes locking on Jason as he climbed out onto the rooftop with him, meeting the night sky with eyes wide and gleaming. Against his chest he was grasping the letter tightly, balling it up into a wad.

"Jason…"

"What the fuck is this?" Jason cussed, nostrils flaring with rage as he tossed the letter. It bounced off Charlie's chest and rolled into the rain gutter where it belonged. "Charlie- what the fuck are you doing?"

Charlie's mouth opened. Closed. Opened. Closed. He had no words.

Jason's eyes went dark and for a moment he turned his head away. When he looked back there was more strength there than he had ever seen before. "What you're just gonna stand there? Say something. I deserve an explanation and don't give me that crap about the greater good. I wanna know the truth."

Charlie scowled. "You don't wanna know- Jason."

"Try me. Not good enough to know why you feel like you need to leave? Just like dad left us? More secrets Charlie? More things you can't tell me! You think you can just disappear on me? What, I'm not strong enough? "

"No, Jason-"

"Then what is it!"

"I'm not strong enough!" Charlie shouted. Voice a hiss in the darkness. "Jason! You were dead! I killed you- you were dead!" Jason was silent so Charlie took his chance to continue- heart speeding up now. "Jason, I can't protect you. Do you know what I did? Do you know what I did to bring you back."

"Bring me back? What are you going on about now?""Jason… you died. Don't you remember?" Charlie reached and touched Jason's chest, right over his heart where he had been shot through. He regretted doing it.

Jason gasped, eyes going wide and breath catching halfway down his throat. Pain and memories hit him and he stumbled a moment. Charlie grasped his arm to keep him upright as his brother clawed a hand to his chest. He pulled down his collar and stared at his chest and the white scar that was directly over his heart. A small X shape as if he had been pinned together with an X stitch. He looked back up at Charlie and he knew Jason remembered. Then as quickly as the moment was there it was gone and Jason blinked darkly at Charlie. "You're insane."

"I can't do this anymore. I'm done." Charlie turned around, ready to leave. He couldn't stand there and try to explain.

"Charlie-"

Charlie wouldn't have turned around if it had not been for his brother grasping onto his arm and whirling him himself. Then as quickly as he had spun- Jason's fist connected with Charlie's jaw.  
Lights flashed in Charlie's eyes as he stumbled backwards. He had never been hit so hard in his entire life. He tasted blood and in an instance had grasped Jason by the front of his shirt. He lifted his brother by his collar, drawing back his own fist to pound in the skinny boys face. And he stopped. What was he doing? Yet Jason stood firm. He wasn't cowering back. He wasn't afraid at all even as his big brother held the fist high. His eyes were set, grey and fierce, glistening in the darkness and his nostrils were flaring. But there was no fear. It was anger. It was pain.

"You gonna hit me, Charlie?" Jason breathed in the darkness, voice filled with all the irritation as before. The threat of a broken nose not even fazing him in the slightest.

Charlie's jaw gapped as he dropped his fist and carefully let his brother go. What was he thinking? He had never once hit Jason. He had never once thought to hurt him as he had a few seconds before. Yet here he was- raising a fist and meaning just that. He meant to hit him. He meant to bash him against the roof for not understanding. He meant to destroy him for punching him and catching him off guard. In that moment he had no clue who he was.

"No." Charlie breathed, face set in stone once more. "No."

"Hit me, big brother. Hit me as hard as you possibly can. Knock me out. In fact-" Jason grabbed Charlie's arm and lifted it so the gauntlet hidden under his sleeve pointed directly at his chest, aiming at his heart. "You might as well just kill me. Shoot me, Charlie. Then you can go running off like the damn coward of a hero you are. You do whatever the hell you want, you bastard but don't leave me here to deal with it. Just kill me."

Charlie was speechless. "You're being ridiculous, Jason. Grow up."

"Grow up? Grow…up?" Jason's voice rose dangerously. "The hell gives you the right to tell me to grow up! You're leaving us! You're running away just because some accident happened! You're insane, Charlie! You're sick and you don't even know it! Leaving me here! You're just gonna leave me here alone and for what? The greater good? Because it's what's best? Don't I get a say in what's best for me? Don't you think it would have been a little worse for me without you here? Just a little difficult knowing you're out there? If you're alive! If you're dead? I'd never even know all because you can't be mature enough to tell me what the fuck is happening! You kept Aaron Stone from me and look how safe I turned out! They tried to kill me! I was dead and you still couldn't protect me! Even keeping me in the dark didn't help! It only made things worse! And now I know and you're keeping more secrets? More rumors on top of it just because you think it's what's best. What's best! What a load of bullshit, Charlie- and you know it! But it's what's best! Like hell you know what's best for anyone! You keep screwing up so just stop trying and take a second to consider or even talk to me or try to make me understand instead of trying to deal with every single thing like it's you against the world 'cause it's not! I'm right here! There's a million people willing to help you if you'd just stop and… and… GAH! Fuck you, Big brother. Fuck you, Aaron Stone!" Jason sniffed. "Son of a bitch." He whispered, voice a sob now.

Charlie hadn't even realized the tears that had begun to stream down his brother's face during his outburst. He had barely realized through the painful words coming out of those lips. It hit so hard- harder than the punch. Harder than anything he could have thrown. And then Jason was sobbing, face wet with fresh tears. His head lolled forwards onto Charlie's chest and he cried, letting Charlie's shirt soak up the evidence of his fear.

Charlie reached gentle arms around him- holding his brother softly until his sobbing had subsided and he stood before his big brother, neither saying a word.

"I won't leave you, Jason. I'm so sorry. I'll never leave you." He whispered.

Jason wiped his face quickly in morning light. Over Charlie's shoulder the sun was rising up, an orange glow to start a new day. Pink melting up into the blue sky above, still dark from night as the last few stars twinkled out.

Jason blinked up at his brother, standing awkwardly on the rooftop. "You're an idiot, Charlie." He said, but his voice hinted at forgiveness. And then- "What is that?"

Charlie looked over his shoulder in the direction of the city. He could barely see the outline of the buildings in the distance but it was a hard sight to miss. From the very top of the tallest skyscraper there were sparks flying and smoke rising. A blimp moved slowly in front of the dawn breaking sun, an unnatural eclipse of the light. From the speakers of the blimp, a voice terrifyingly familiar to Charlie spoke and Charlie's blood ran cold.

"The time has come, human scum. We have had enough of your incompetence. It is a time to rebuild!"

Tetra was free.

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_Hope you enjoyed it! And yes it is the end of this story. I have a last one planned out to close everything off however it is going to be short. Three, four, maybe five chapters tops. It is more of an epilogue than anything. **A Corrupt World** is coming... soon as I feel like editing it. haha. HOPE YOU LIKED THIS! Sorry to the highest extent that this took so impossibly long to post. Musta been terrible I know. lols. Anyhoo- please review and keep eyes open for my work! _

_Thanks to everyone for sticking around! Shout out to me #1 reviewer hyperenchantress! =D sorry if I spelled that wrong. haha. not a good speller. _

_HAVE A GREAT NIGHT!_


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